Shep Smith Takes On “Discredited Website” And Even “This Network” Over Sherrod Video

[kpete]

Shep Smith Takes On “Discredited Website” And Even “This Network” Over Sherrod Video
by Glynnis MacNicol | 5:31 pm, July 21st, 2010

Add this to the long list of Shep Smith must-see TV moments. Fox cut out of Robert Gibbs’ stumbling Shirley Sherrod presser today and directly into Shep Smith’s Studio B. Said Shep, dead seriously: “I’m now being told we’re leaving this press conference, and since I’m being told that we’re leaving.” That sort of set the tone for what was to come. And what came was as close to an honest excoriation of Andrew Breitbart, President Barack Obama, and, at times, Fox News over their handling of the Sherrod video clip as one expects to see on cable.

Shep described Sherrod as “the woman in the center of a racially-tinged firestorm involving the Obama administration, the NAACP, the website Big Government, its founder Andrew Breitbart, and this network.” He went on to say “We now know…her current mission was to help the poor and disadvantaged of any and all races. The video, taken completely out of context, it ran all over the Internet, and television, including on this network.”

Suffice to say, it’s not every day, or any day really, that you hear a Fox host call out their own network with regards to editorial decisions. And Shep doesn’t stop there, he goes out of his way to differentiate his show from others that ran and responded to the video before the facts were out:

***** “We here at Studio B did not run the video and did not reference the story in any way for many reasons, among them: we didn’t know who shot it, we didn’t know when it was shot, we didn’t know the context of the statement, and because of the history of the videos on the site where it was posted, in short we do not and did not trust the source.”

Clearly not guidelines either parts of Fox News or the Administration followed. And that was just his opening salvo. To guest Juan Williams he said: “The White House says it is not, but it is clearly obsessed with Glenn Beck…anyone who doubted it can now stop doubting it.” And then in appropriately aghast tones Shep takes everyone from Breitbart (“a widely discredited website”), the White House, to the NAACP to task for the manner in which they reacted to this video. “What in the world has happened to our industry and the White House…how can the White House lead and govern if what they’re worried about something that happens on a cable news channel which they’ve already said doesn’t matter.” Indeed. Watch below.

VIDEO:

http://www.mediaite.com/online/shep-smith-takes-on-discredited-website-and-even-this-network-over-sherrod/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+mediaite%2FClHj+%28Mediaite%29

[MadMaddie]

1. Damn that's damning!

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. This has to be part of the Ministry of Truth Shtick

or he is the only remaining "reporter" in the Ministry. He'd better be careful, room 101 at the Ministry of Love awaits.

[Jennicut]

3. Shep has always been this way. I think they keep him around to claim the "fair and balanced" thing.

[Recursion]

20. "I don't give a rat's ass if [waterboarding] helps. We're America. We don't do that"

I've grudgingly liked Shep for a while. Plus he's a fellow Mississippian.

[Prophet 451]

8. I suspect the latter

He seems to the only remaining journalist. How long he lasts before being bounced is open to question.

[cynatnite]

4. And that's their puppet they point to so they can say they're "fair and balanced" n/t

[Plucketeer]

15. I agree.

He's the "Mourning Joe" of Faux Gnus.

[morillon]

5. Shep Smith is awesome. n/t

[uponit7771]

6. I don't expect Shep will be on FAUX news long, he's spoken the truth too many times

[hvn_nbr_2]

10. I think that he thinks that too.

His statement about how his show handled this story appears to me to be a disclaimer to potential future employers: Hey, don't tar me (too badly) with the Fox brush.

[gateley]

7. Can't we bring him over to the Light? nt

[monmouth]

11. Shep and David Shuster would be a great treat IMO....n/t

[highplainsdem]

9. K&R

[skip fox]

12. I watched this live and found it tepid compared to what I expected.

Smith is getting a repuation for being a straight shooteer, but he's only packing an air rifle.

[lame54]

13. Watch the video - they do what they can absolve Fox and Glenn Beck of any responsibility - pathetic

:puke: :puke: :puke:

[avaistheone1]

14. So Shep is the Faux News cleanup crew?

Who knew?

[louis-t]

16. He still blames the WH more than fox.

As long as the WH and NAACP are getting more blame than fox, they're ahead. He first pats himself on the back for "not running the video", then complains about how someone else reacted to it. I won't go to the link, but I would be surprised if he actually questions the motivation of Breitbart and his enablers.

[Uncle Joe]

17. Juan Williams was still deflecting away from FOX "News" or corporate media responsibility.

Around the 3:40 or so mark Smith asks "What's happened to our industry?" and Williams replies, "Internet is an open sewer with no editorial control."

FOX "News" is part of the traditional corporate media; the industry; Smith was referring to, they ran the story with no investigation from a "discredited" source, no follow up, no checking in to context, no rebuttal, but Williams couldn't bring himself to acknowledge that, so he quickly diverts to the Internet.

Even at the end of this exchange, Smith cites the Obama Administration's concern about Beck getting a hold of this, again Beck is a mainstay of FOX "News," aka: traditional corporate media, how can you get more in the sewer than Beck?

Juan Williams seemed to be doing a 21st century Flip Wilson version of "The Devil; (Internet) made us do it."

Thanks for the thread, kpete.

[Downtown Hound]

18. It's long been rumored that Shep is gay

Hence, he's not quite so fanatically Reich wing as the rest of them.

[wyldwolf]

19. well, that little dalliance with Jennifer Lopez made him see the light.

[johnlucas]

21. I don't trust Shep Smith. Sounds like Good Cop Bad Cop

I'm not buying Shepard Smith's act.
Not at all.

Fox uses him to play the Good Cop role whenever it does something ignorant like they did with Sherrod.
It's to fool the uninitiated into believing that Fox News supports all views & is not an ideological network (or more accurately one that plays to that certain ideology to get ratings/money).

Fox News is the Republican News Network & always has been. What interests Australian Rupert Murdoch in the politics of the U.S. is purely profit. Playing this role makes him money. He recognizes how easy those who follow the Republican party/Conservative buy wholesale into demagoguery & so it's easy to garner ratings.

Shepard Smith is just part of the illusion. He will always have a job there because all he has to do is look pretty & keep cashing the checks. He'll say what he has to & what he's told to like most every newsperson around. I don't trust most people in news including Keith Olbermann (even though I like how dramatic he sounds when he rips into Republicans & their associates).

It's nothing but Good Cop Bad Cop. Don't fall for it. It's a game.
John Lucas